[quote=smurfsahoy]I mean it would help you if you were willing to walk ALLLL the way back to your spawn with the compass, and then to your base. But that could easily be a 10x longer journey than the direct path from here to your base.[quote]
As pointed out earlier in the thread are there sevaral ways to find your way back to your base without going to spawn first.
Just because your compass points to your spawn don't mean that you have to blindly follow it to spawn.
That sure would have made the north pole quite crowded.
I doubt notch will make the compass pole moveable anyway so i guess you'll just have to wait until he implements maps if you'r not able to navigate with the current tools.
As pointed out earlier in the thread are there sevaral ways to find your way back to your base without going to spawn first.
Yes, I am aware... I was the one posting all of the trigonometry.
I was responding specifically to Airclot's suggestion of an arrow/memorization of the simple direction of your base at the spawn point. That information alone is only useful AT the spawn point, which is often inefficient, making this alone not great advice for everyone.
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Przerwap, upon looking at some code I had just written: "...Gav... That's not how programming works."
I think that people who are asking for a compass that points due north are taking advantage of the fact that they live far enough away from magnetic north that it seems like a compass is pointing in some arbitrary, abstracted direction.
The compass in game is like a compass in real life, and you need to use it like one in real life. Pick out landmarks, count your paces, readjust your heading often. If we need anything, it's the ability to make maps, an overlay that shows the compass in more detail, and maybe a simple pedometer.
the way I use the compass is I remember the way the compass points from the inside of my houses, then orient my compass in the same way then walk towards my house.
simple.
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Quote from mjcabooseblu »
Muncher is right, listen to him, he can cure the blind and make paraplegics walk.
I'm still fairly new at this game--and have gone through about 12 worlds trying out different ideas for starting out--but I plan on paving some roads between various points of interest. If you aren't willing to build some beacons, recognize some landmarks, or make some roads, I think you should be force to wander the world for 40 years minutes.
Okay. why do you insist on things changing directions on the compas? how about a compass that points NORTH WEST SOUTH and EAST.
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Zombies in the area will have the skin melt away and only their SKELETONS will remain, and they'll shoot ARROWS from their STERNUMS. Creepers will still explode as usual, but their suicide will also release a LAVA SPRING from their REMAINS.
Okay. why do you insist on things changing directions on the compas? how about a compass that points NORTH WEST SOUTH and EAST.
Real life compasses are based off a spherical coordinate system. Compasses in real life point to magnetic north. However, since the minecraft world is flat, we have to use a cylindrical coordinate system. We still need magnetic north and a place to consider the origin. What better spot for both magnetic north and the origin than the spawn point? It's the first meaningful point on a new map.
The compass in game still points to magnetic north (like in real life) and therefore, we have a south, an east and a west. For example, a person traveling north or south should have an increasing or decreasing radial distance respectively, and a person traveling west or east will have an decreasing or increasing azimuth respectively.
Basing a compass off a some Cartesian direction based off how Notch programmed the sun, moon and clouds to move is quite unrealistic. First off, wind changes direction, so the clouds are unreallistic, and second, the sun/moon does not shift in the sky depending on how far "north" you moved. I'd rather these be fixed as close as possible to real life than the compass be changed to match some alternate reality.
Maybe a little less profanity? Although, before reading your post I hadn't realised how incredibly easy it actually is to find direction in the world. The only problem I seemed to have was wandering off extremely far from my base and not knowing which way to go. Which the compass seems to solve. Anyways, thanks for the logic, be nicer next time :tongue.gif:
For the love of all that is good, can we discuss something without sounding so vile? I understand that you can do this or that and trigonomerate and whatnot. However, my issue is manifold:
First of all, my effective render distance is TINY. Don't tell me to get a better computer, that isn't the point here.
Second of all, my initial spawn is a 2x2 island of sand surrounded by so much water that I've marked three sperate points of reference that are utterly invisible from one another in Tiny render distance in a line and still not seen shore.
Lastly, I don't die very often, at all. Thus, I don't often go between my spawn and my base.
This all adds up to the compass pointing off to a 2x2 pile of sand that I can barely reach without losing my orientation because once I get there, my readings are messed up and I end of three for four miles away on a 90 degree angle.
Whatever, I might as well not bother with redstone at all. To me, a person of average-lowerr intellect who has no idea what logic gates are for and is just fine with using wooden doors and hitting his TnT, it's about as useless as Gold.
I find it incredibly useful. I can go to caves without placing a trail and not be lost when I exit. I remember my first world I played I explored too far out and got lost. Took me 3 hours to find my base lol. Now the only problem is re-finding the cave if i want to go back, since I didn't place a trail xD
I hope it stays as it is. N-S-E-W is impractical in MC
For the love of all that is good, can we discuss something without sounding so vile? I understand that you can do this or that and trigonomerate and whatnot. However, my issue is manifold:
First of all, my effective render distance is TINY. Don't tell me to get a better computer, that isn't the point here.
Second of all, my initial spawn is a 2x2 island of sand surrounded by so much water that I've marked three sperate points of reference that are utterly invisible from one another in Tiny render distance in a line and still not seen shore.
Lastly, I don't die very often, at all. Thus, I don't often go between my spawn and my base.
This all adds up to the compass pointing off to a 2x2 pile of sand that I can barely reach without losing my orientation because once I get there, my readings are messed up and I end of three for four miles away on a 90 degree angle.
Whatever, I might as well not bother with redstone at all. To me, a person of average-lowerr intellect who has no idea what logic gates are for and is just fine with using wooden doors and hitting his TnT, it's about as useless as Gold.
A real life compass points to some non-constant point in a frozen sea; consider a 2x2 island lucky.
As for the beacons. Why did you place them outside your render range? What's the point of that?
Everything aside, using a compass doesn't require trigonometry at all. what we need is something to set our heading and maybe a detailed compass overlay.
You cant do this with real compasses why would you want to in minecraft?
Compasses work by pointing to your spawn just remember what direction you are from your spawn
For example
My main base is to the left of the spawn point so if i follow the compass i just have to go left from there.
Compasses + the sun are great ways to remeber what direction you need to go
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"You messed up. Now I gotta mess you up. It's the law." —BA baracus (Mr.T)
"CREEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEED!!!" --Tzneetch in regards to a chess match against Creed.
Maths is fine in games, for example Eve Online; Space(spread)sheets and Spaceships.
but not in games like Minecraft.
So, let me see if I understand. People are wiling to take almost twice as long on building projects by having to hide from monsters at night, up to 4 or 5x as long gathering materials when sometimes they don't even like doing it, because they say these are the purest ways to play, but taking literally one minute after hours of exploration to find your position in a game-pure way using equations somebody else provided for you -- that's just "too much zomg math game iz a grind!!" Instead, you have to have a redundant, unnecessary, and painfully unrealistic "magical magnetic pole" be implemented for you?
The magnetic pole craftable object is so silly and antithetical to what a compass IS that if you're going to implement it, you might as well just have a lame object that tells you your straight up coordinates, IMO.
well that sort of assumes you can get an exact reading from the compass.. which you can't. It's rather approximate.
No, it is very exact, actually. Somebody simply needs to construct a quick reference table for which pixelated image corresponds to which angle. Then you take reading 1 after the compass image has JUST changed, then walk side c of the triangle until the image JUST barely changes, and you know the numebrs exactly from your lookup table.
I am slowly working on this myself as a side project.
Unfortunately, for many of us, even a little math in a game is simply too much math :tongue.gif:
I for one am just BAD at it. Always have been. Oh, I can do computer programming and other things, but show me an algebraic equation and I'm likely to just throw a shoe at you. Ask me to SOLVE it and all you'll get is a blank stare. Far as I'm concerned, that's part of what computers are for, is to do the solving for me. (In reality though, it's not like I havent TRIED to learn this stuff... cause I did, in college. Just that I honestly am REALLY bad at it).
But really though, I think the compass's current function is perfect as it is. I made sure to set up my main base pretty near to my spawn point for one simple reason: So that when I inevitably die to a million skeleton arrows, I wouldnt have to try too hard to find it. It made alot of sense to just put it within view of the point (particularly since I set it up WELL before compasses). And now, if I were to make a new world, I'd do the same... either set up a base right near the point, or if I get a world where it doesnt seem I can do that, I'd just re-generate the world till I get one that'll let me do this, since we cant set spawns right now.
>A real life compass points to some non-constant point in a frozen sea; consider a 2x2 island lucky.
Last I checked, you can't carry lava around in handheld buckets, either. So... yeah.
>As for the beacons. Why did you place them outside your render range? What's the point of that?
Everything aside, using a compass doesn't require trigonometry at all. what we need is something to set our heading and maybe a detailed compass overlay.
That's true. I just expected more from something that's so expensive and hard to obtain, is all.
My personal opinion, I like if the compass pointed north... or a north magnetic point, if the MineCraft world is round. (Haven't seen proof of a round world yet.) But a north pointed compass would make me happy.
And for people who get lost on the surface, break out the grid paper and map your surroundings. Until you can write in books.
As for actually use of the compass in game, haven't yet. (Still digging.) So, can only put in opinions what I like to see. I'm fine with the compass pointing to your spawn location, but I still would like the north facing.
In minecraft, the world is infinite. No matter how far you travel, you will keep going. Since all compasses point to a specific point, a north pointing compass would infact lead you to a north pole. But minecraft doesn't have poles....
Except of course, for your spawn point. Which is the magnetic pole your compass points to. Thus it would seem to me that your spawn point is the absolute north pole of minecraft, and your compass does indeed already point north.
Kind of like that old joke "how can a house have all fours walls point south? By being on the north pole! "
I think there should be two kinds of compass: cardinal-facing compasses and ones that focus on something else.
Above ground, I can always tell the cardinal directions because the sun/moon follow the same path and move quickly enough there's no ambiguity at zenith. Unfortunately when I'm underground the compass is little use if I want cardinal directions unless I noted its reading before descending *and* I'm not particularly close to the spawn point. I haven't made any elaborate underground tunnels yet, but when I do I'll probably have to resort to signs to help keep the cardinal directions in mind. Because of this, I think a compass that always points cardinal north would be useful.
I'd also like to see a compass that displays the behaviors of a compass pointing at a pole. Real-life topography maps have instructions for how to account for the differences between cardinal and magnetic north on the map. This is important not only because magnetic north isn't in the same place as cardinal north, but also because your longitudinal distance from the pole affects how dramatic east/west movements will affect your reading. This is easy to see in Minecraft: walk around near your spawn point and the compass will go crazy. Farther away from the spawn point the movements are slower. This is a convenient property (if you can rely on an accurate reading) for performing trigonometric distance calculations as outlined earlier. You might not like math in your Minecraft, but I like the idea.
However, craftable poles have concerns. If you can build multiple, how do you determine which compass points at which pole? If you're limited to building one at a time, it's less useful because any previous directions you remember will be invalid (i.e. "Head north according to the relative compass" will change.) Whether there's multiple poles or not, most of the concerns with "spawn point is the pole" will exist with this kind of compass, but having another compass that always points cardinal north would mitigate it as you could always compare the two when needed. In the end, I think a better solution to "my spawn point isn't a relevant reference point" would be for Notch to let you change your spawn point without the use of a map editor. I think most people upset with the way the compass works now would be satisfied by that unless I misunderstand some elite game techniques that I haven't started using yet.
So in short, I think we need two compasses: one that always points north and one that always points at the spawn point. In addition, if you could move your spawn point many of the reasons for wanting craftable compass poles go away.
Alternatively, an in-game map would help a lot. It wouldn't even have to display the whole world, just the explored portions. If I had that I wouldn't ever need a compass because it wouldn't take much to figure out which way I was headed.
*edit*
I also more or less agree with FritoBandito, but I'd like to add this: my "cardinal compass" would behave as if the pole is always some near-infinite distance north from you on a sphere. This would prevent it from displaying the behavior where North changes slightly as you move in certain directions. The notion of a "pole" on an infinite map is something that doesn't make sense and an explanation of why is something that took up too much room in a first draft of my post.
What if the map editor just made a "grain" to the underground strata? Like clods of dirt and mineral veins underground were always oblong such that they are longer North-South than East-West.
Would be a lot cooler way to gauge cardinality underground than double kinds of compasses.
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Przerwap, upon looking at some code I had just written: "...Gav... That's not how programming works."
Now I know that its infinite in all ways, but I like to have a cardinal north facing compass. A compass that ALWAYS points north to help one find oneself, to get bearings, and to aid in mapping.
Quote from SittenSpynne »
Alternatively, an in-game map would help a lot.
I admire the fact that no in-game mapping exists. It provides you to learn how to navigate or mark trails, and enables players to get lost much more easily. An in-game map would take away from some of the "survival" aspects of it.
Made a new map a couple days ago, built my house/fort thing on the spawn (because there was a dungeon right under it im using for a monster farm now)
Got incredibly lost while looking for large caves, i must have gone for about an hour away from my spawn going down random caves and holes. managed to find some redstone in a cave, and made a compass, turns out i had got turned around somewhere and i was only a few hundred blocks away.
now i allways carry a compass, it also helps me keep a straight line while exploring so i can make straight roads later on to my camps.
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Your friendly neighborhood dragon. Don't be scared, I won't bite!
I am here for you, Don't be afraid to send me a message.
As pointed out earlier in the thread are there sevaral ways to find your way back to your base without going to spawn first.
Just because your compass points to your spawn don't mean that you have to blindly follow it to spawn.
That sure would have made the north pole quite crowded.
I doubt notch will make the compass pole moveable anyway so i guess you'll just have to wait until he implements maps if you'r not able to navigate with the current tools.
Warning: Content of link might be highly addictive.
Yes, I am aware... I was the one posting all of the trigonometry.
I was responding specifically to Airclot's suggestion of an arrow/memorization of the simple direction of your base at the spawn point. That information alone is only useful AT the spawn point, which is often inefficient, making this alone not great advice for everyone.
The compass in game is like a compass in real life, and you need to use it like one in real life. Pick out landmarks, count your paces, readjust your heading often. If we need anything, it's the ability to make maps, an overlay that shows the compass in more detail, and maybe a simple pedometer.
simple.
yearsminutes.Real life compasses are based off a spherical coordinate system. Compasses in real life point to magnetic north. However, since the minecraft world is flat, we have to use a cylindrical coordinate system. We still need magnetic north and a place to consider the origin. What better spot for both magnetic north and the origin than the spawn point? It's the first meaningful point on a new map.
The compass in game still points to magnetic north (like in real life) and therefore, we have a south, an east and a west. For example, a person traveling north or south should have an increasing or decreasing radial distance respectively, and a person traveling west or east will have an decreasing or increasing azimuth respectively.
Basing a compass off a some Cartesian direction based off how Notch programmed the sun, moon and clouds to move is quite unrealistic. First off, wind changes direction, so the clouds are unreallistic, and second, the sun/moon does not shift in the sky depending on how far "north" you moved. I'd rather these be fixed as close as possible to real life than the compass be changed to match some alternate reality.
EDIT: Notch is a person, not a verb
Maybe a little less profanity? Although, before reading your post I hadn't realised how incredibly easy it actually is to find direction in the world. The only problem I seemed to have was wandering off extremely far from my base and not knowing which way to go. Which the compass seems to solve. Anyways, thanks for the logic, be nicer next time :tongue.gif:
For the love of all that is good, can we discuss something without sounding so vile? I understand that you can do this or that and trigonomerate and whatnot. However, my issue is manifold:
First of all, my effective render distance is TINY. Don't tell me to get a better computer, that isn't the point here.
Second of all, my initial spawn is a 2x2 island of sand surrounded by so much water that I've marked three sperate points of reference that are utterly invisible from one another in Tiny render distance in a line and still not seen shore.
Lastly, I don't die very often, at all. Thus, I don't often go between my spawn and my base.
This all adds up to the compass pointing off to a 2x2 pile of sand that I can barely reach without losing my orientation because once I get there, my readings are messed up and I end of three for four miles away on a 90 degree angle.
Whatever, I might as well not bother with redstone at all. To me, a person of average-lowerr intellect who has no idea what logic gates are for and is just fine with using wooden doors and hitting his TnT, it's about as useless as Gold.
I hope it stays as it is. N-S-E-W is impractical in MC
A real life compass points to some non-constant point in a frozen sea; consider a 2x2 island lucky.
As for the beacons. Why did you place them outside your render range? What's the point of that?
Everything aside, using a compass doesn't require trigonometry at all. what we need is something to set our heading and maybe a detailed compass overlay.
Compasses work by pointing to your spawn just remember what direction you are from your spawn
For example
My main base is to the left of the spawn point so if i follow the compass i just have to go left from there.
Compasses + the sun are great ways to remeber what direction you need to go
"CREEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEED!!!" --Tzneetch in regards to a chess match against Creed.
Unfortunately, for many of us, even a little math in a game is simply too much math :tongue.gif:
I for one am just BAD at it. Always have been. Oh, I can do computer programming and other things, but show me an algebraic equation and I'm likely to just throw a shoe at you. Ask me to SOLVE it and all you'll get is a blank stare. Far as I'm concerned, that's part of what computers are for, is to do the solving for me. (In reality though, it's not like I havent TRIED to learn this stuff... cause I did, in college. Just that I honestly am REALLY bad at it).
But really though, I think the compass's current function is perfect as it is. I made sure to set up my main base pretty near to my spawn point for one simple reason: So that when I inevitably die to a million skeleton arrows, I wouldnt have to try too hard to find it. It made alot of sense to just put it within view of the point (particularly since I set it up WELL before compasses). And now, if I were to make a new world, I'd do the same... either set up a base right near the point, or if I get a world where it doesnt seem I can do that, I'd just re-generate the world till I get one that'll let me do this, since we cant set spawns right now.
Last I checked, you can't carry lava around in handheld buckets, either. So... yeah.
>As for the beacons. Why did you place them outside your render range? What's the point of that?
Everything aside, using a compass doesn't require trigonometry at all. what we need is something to set our heading and maybe a detailed compass overlay.
That's true. I just expected more from something that's so expensive and hard to obtain, is all.
And for people who get lost on the surface, break out the grid paper and map your surroundings. Until you can write in books.
As for actually use of the compass in game, haven't yet. (Still digging.) So, can only put in opinions what I like to see. I'm fine with the compass pointing to your spawn location, but I still would like the north facing.
In minecraft, the world is infinite. No matter how far you travel, you will keep going. Since all compasses point to a specific point, a north pointing compass would infact lead you to a north pole. But minecraft doesn't have poles....
Except of course, for your spawn point. Which is the magnetic pole your compass points to. Thus it would seem to me that your spawn point is the absolute north pole of minecraft, and your compass does indeed already point north.
Kind of like that old joke "how can a house have all fours walls point south? By being on the north pole! "
Above ground, I can always tell the cardinal directions because the sun/moon follow the same path and move quickly enough there's no ambiguity at zenith. Unfortunately when I'm underground the compass is little use if I want cardinal directions unless I noted its reading before descending *and* I'm not particularly close to the spawn point. I haven't made any elaborate underground tunnels yet, but when I do I'll probably have to resort to signs to help keep the cardinal directions in mind. Because of this, I think a compass that always points cardinal north would be useful.
I'd also like to see a compass that displays the behaviors of a compass pointing at a pole. Real-life topography maps have instructions for how to account for the differences between cardinal and magnetic north on the map. This is important not only because magnetic north isn't in the same place as cardinal north, but also because your longitudinal distance from the pole affects how dramatic east/west movements will affect your reading. This is easy to see in Minecraft: walk around near your spawn point and the compass will go crazy. Farther away from the spawn point the movements are slower. This is a convenient property (if you can rely on an accurate reading) for performing trigonometric distance calculations as outlined earlier. You might not like math in your Minecraft, but I like the idea.
However, craftable poles have concerns. If you can build multiple, how do you determine which compass points at which pole? If you're limited to building one at a time, it's less useful because any previous directions you remember will be invalid (i.e. "Head north according to the relative compass" will change.) Whether there's multiple poles or not, most of the concerns with "spawn point is the pole" will exist with this kind of compass, but having another compass that always points cardinal north would mitigate it as you could always compare the two when needed. In the end, I think a better solution to "my spawn point isn't a relevant reference point" would be for Notch to let you change your spawn point without the use of a map editor. I think most people upset with the way the compass works now would be satisfied by that unless I misunderstand some elite game techniques that I haven't started using yet.
So in short, I think we need two compasses: one that always points north and one that always points at the spawn point. In addition, if you could move your spawn point many of the reasons for wanting craftable compass poles go away.
Alternatively, an in-game map would help a lot. It wouldn't even have to display the whole world, just the explored portions. If I had that I wouldn't ever need a compass because it wouldn't take much to figure out which way I was headed.
*edit*
I also more or less agree with FritoBandito, but I'd like to add this: my "cardinal compass" would behave as if the pole is always some near-infinite distance north from you on a sphere. This would prevent it from displaying the behavior where North changes slightly as you move in certain directions. The notion of a "pole" on an infinite map is something that doesn't make sense and an explanation of why is something that took up too much room in a first draft of my post.
Would be a lot cooler way to gauge cardinality underground than double kinds of compasses.
I admire the fact that no in-game mapping exists. It provides you to learn how to navigate or mark trails, and enables players to get lost much more easily. An in-game map would take away from some of the "survival" aspects of it.
Got incredibly lost while looking for large caves, i must have gone for about an hour away from my spawn going down random caves and holes. managed to find some redstone in a cave, and made a compass, turns out i had got turned around somewhere and i was only a few hundred blocks away.
now i allways carry a compass, it also helps me keep a straight line while exploring so i can make straight roads later on to my camps.
I am here for you, Don't be afraid to send me a message.